Impromptu In The Assize Court At Lincoln.

Sir W. Bovill was specially retained in an action for damages caused by the overflowing of the banks of the Witham. With great spirit he contended that the river had for three days flowed from the sea.

The moon in the valley of Ajalon
    Stood still at the word of the prophet;
But since certain "Essays" were written
    We don't think so very much of it.
Now, a prophet is raised up among us,
    Whose miracles none can gainsay;
For he spoke, and the great river Witham
    Flowed three days, uphill, the wrong way.

Horace Smith

Horace Smith was an English poet and novelist, known for his collaboration with his brother James Smith in writing parodies. The brothers published 'Rejected Addresses' in 1812, which humorously imitated contemporary poets and became highly popular. Horace was also a friend of Percy Bysshe Shelley and wrote various works, including novels that reflect his interest in social issues and history. His writing often combined wit with a keen social conscience.

Horace Smith

Isle Of Wight - Spring, 1891.

Horace Smith, Simple Poetry

Impromptu In The Assize Court, Nottingham,

Horace Smith, Simple Poetry

The Curate To His Slippers.

Horace Smith, Simple Poetry

To The Rev. A. A. In The Country From His Friend In London.

Horace Smith, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Impromptu In The Assize Court, Nottingham,

On seeing BRET HARTE come upon the Bench.

Thanks for an hour of laughing
    In a world that is growing old;
Thanks for an hour of weeping
    In a world that is growing cold;
For we who have wept with Dickens,
    And we who have laughed with Boz,
Have renewed the days of our childhood
    With his American Coz.

Horace Smith

A Friendly Apology For A Certain Justice Of Peace By Way Of Defence Of Hartley Hutcheson, Esq. By James Black-Well, Operator For The Feet

    But he by bawling news about,
    And aptly using brush and clout,
    A justice of the peace became,
    To punish rogues who do the same.

I sing the man of courage tried,
O'errun with ignorance and pride,
Who boldly hunted out disgrace
With canker'd mind, and hideous face;
The first who made (let none deny it)
The libel-vending rogues be quiet.
    The fact was glorious, we must own,
For Hartley was before unknown,
Contemn'd I mean; - for who would chuse
So vile a subject for the Muse?
    'Twas once the noblest of his wishes
To fill his paunch with scraps from dishes,
For which he'd parch before the grate,
Or wind the jack's slow-rising weight,
(Such toils as best his talents fit,)
Or polish shoes, or turn the spit;
But, unexpe...

Jonathan Swift

Ecclesiastical Sonnets - Part II. - XVII - Wicliffe

Once more the Church is seized with sudden fear,
And at her call is Wicliffe disinhumed:
Yea, his dry bones to ashes are consumed
And flung into the brook that travels near;
Forthwith, that ancient Voice which Streams can hear
Thus speaks (that Voice which walks upon the wind,
Though seldom heard by busy human kind)
"As thou these ashes, little Brook! wilt bear
"Into the Avon, Avon to the tide
"Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas,
"Into main Ocean they, this deed accurst
"An emblem yields to friends and enemies
"How the bold Teacher's Doctrine, sanctified
"By truth, shall spread, throughout the world dispersed."

William Wordsworth

The Sorrows Of Father Cam.

    1. WATNEY        Lady Margaret.        
    2. BEEBEE        Lady Margaret.        
    3. PIGOTT        Corpus                        
    4. KINGLAKE    3rd Trinity.            
    5. STEAVENSON    Trinity Hall
    6. BORTHWICK    1st Trinity.
    7. GRIFFITHS    3rd Trinity.
    8. LAWES        3rd Trinity.
                    Steerer, ARCHER, Corpus.


    One night, as I silently wandered
        By Cam's slow meandering stream,
    And many things mentally pondered,
        I saw, as it were in a dream,
    A black head emerge from the billows,
        A broad body swim through the flood,
    Till, beneath the o'ershadowing willows,
        It sank gently down in the mud.

    All alone - as a Scholar of Tyrwhitt
        Whe...

Edward Woodley Bowling

Abraham Davenport

In the old days (a custom laid aside
With breeches and cocked hats) the people sent
Their wisest men to make the public laws.
And so, from a brown homestead, where the Sound
Drinks the small tribute of the Mianas,
Waved over by the woods of Rippowams,
And hallowed by pure lives and tranquil deaths,
Stamford sent up to the councils of the State
Wisdom and grace in Abraham Davenport.

'T was on a May-day of the far old year
Seventeen hundred eighty, that there fell
Over the bloom and sweet life of the Spring,
Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon,
A horror of great darkness, like the night
In day of which the Norland sagas tell,

The Twilight of the Gods. The low-hung sky
Was black with ominous clouds, save where its rim
Was fringed with a d...

John Greenleaf Whittier

The Land

When Julius Fabricius, Sub-Prefect of the Weald,
In the days of Diocletian owned our Lower River-field,
He called to him Hobdenius-a Briton of the Clay,
Saying: "What about that River-piece for layin' in to hay?"

And the aged Hobden answered: "I remember as a lad
My father told your father that she wanted dreenin' bad.
An' the more that you neeglect her the less you'll get her clean.
Have it jest as you've a mind to, but, if I was you, I'd dreen."

So they drained it long and crossways in the lavish Roman style,
Still we find among the river-drift their flakes of ancient tile,
And in drouthy middle August, when the bones of meadows show,
We can trace the lines they followed sixteen hundred years ago.

Then Julius Fabricius died as even Prefects do,
And after ...

Rudyard